Elegant imperial Japanese

Kyoto is about arts and culture while Tokyo is about setting trends. The cuisines coming out of these cities, too, are as different as night and day. Pauline D. Loh savors the slow food of old Japan in Hong Kong.

Everything here is about pure natural flavors, lovingly cooked the traditional way. The bean curd is made fresh from soybeans grown locally, using water from springs that flow down Kyoto's maple-fringed mountains. Then, they are flown to Hong Kong daily.

The tofu is served many ways at Kyo-Shun, so named to reflect the best of seasonal cuisine from the ancient Japanese capital. Carefully cut out with a floral mold, it is slathered with sweet yellow miso and quickly blasted under the grill and toasted to a deep golden topping.